GENTLEMAN'S MAGAZINE. MARCH, 1837. BY SYLVANUS URBAN, GENT. CONTENTS. PAGE. MINOR CORRESPONDENCE.- Ancient Parish Plays. Second-hand sepulchral brasses.-Portrait of Marg. Duchess of York.-Hopkinson's Yorkshire MSS. 226 PRIOR'S LIFE AND WRITINGS OF OLIVER GOLDSMITH. Pedigree of the Poet Goldsmith... MEMORIALS OF LITERARY CHARACTERS.-No. XVIII. Letters of Sir John Vanbrugh to Tonson the Bookseller Anecdote of David Hume, the Historian Song by Robert Anderson the Cumberland Poet.... Aggregation of the Families of Grimaldi and Ceba at Genoa in 1446. Notices of the Truckle-bed. 227 242 243 245 ib. ib. 247 248 249 256 260 261 Ruins of Nature and Art in Italy-Volcanoes... Account of Toddington, co. Gloucester, the seat of C. H. Tracy, Esq. Historical Notices of Mendham Priory.... Letter of Lady Dorothy Hastings, a Recusant in 1619 Ancient Poor-box and keys at Blickling, 262.-Sepulchral Brasses at Bodyam.. 263 Lord Rosslyn and Lord Thurlow.. Pronunciation of Ache.-Versions of Homer Letters relating to the Lunsford Family.. Groat of Edward I., 266.-Coin of Carausius. Ancient City discovered in North America... RETROSPECTIVE REVIEW.-The Carlovingian Romances.. REVIEW OF NEW PUBLICATIONS. 264 265 ib. 267 ib 268 271 Dyce's Works of Bentley, 273.-Murphy's Church of Batalha, 279.-Essays on a few Subjects of General Interest, 280.- Poetical Works of the Rev. T. Dale, 281.-The Reign of Humbug-Pugin's Architectural Contrasts, 285.-Caveler's Specimens of Gothic Architecture, 286.-Hicklin's History of Nottingham Castle, 287.-Long's Observations on Roman Roads, 288.— The Cheltenham Annuaire, 291.-Rugby Register, 292.-Student of Padua, 294.-Cabinet of Modern Art, 295.-MISCELLANEOUS REVIEWS.... 297, 298 FINE ARTS.-Exhibition of the British Institution.... LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC INTELLIGENCE. New Publications, 300.-Learned Societies, Literary Institutions, &c. 301. -Institute of British Architects, 302.-Mr. Crosse's Experiments ANTIQUARIAN RESEARCHES.-Society of Antiquaries, 304.-Royal Society, Etruscan Antiquities, &c.... ..... HISTORICAL CHRONICLE. Proceedings in Parliament, 307.- Foreign OBITUARY; with Memoirs of the Duke of Montrose; Earl of Arran; Lord ...... 299 303 306 314 315 329 Bill of Mortality-Markets-Prices of Shares, 335.-Meteorological Diary-Stocks 336 Embellished with a View of TODDINGTON HOUSE, Gloucestershire; Representations of ancient KEYS at BLICKLING, BRASSES at BODYAM, &c. MINOR CORRESPONDENCE. Mr. JOHN CUNNINGTON, of Braintree, remarks:-"Mr. Collier, in his very interesting History of English Dramatic Poetry, quotes from an old Church-Book of Boughton-Blean in Kent, as follows :Anno d'ni mlio dxxxvti (1535). This year Corpus Christi Play was plaid at Boughton Street. But at Braintree we have undoubted information that in 1523 a Play of St. Swythyn was acted in the Church, another of St. Andrew in 1525, another of Placy Dacy alias St. Ewe Stacy in 1534, another not named in 1567, and another in 1570; and that in that year 18. 8d. was received for letting the Playing garment; and that in 1571 there was received for a Play book 20s., and for fending the play geer 8s. 7d.; and finally, that in 1579 three curtains were sold for 68. 4d., and the Players' apparel for 50s. In this March of Intellect Braintree appears to have had the start of Boughton by 12 years, in the performance of Plays for the amusement of the common people; but if earlier accounts exist it is very proper we should give up the point."-We may be allowed to remark, that our correspondent seems to be fighting for a shadow, as the entry of such performances in the parish books for the first time at a certain date does not prove that they had not existed there a century before. Supposing the MS. of the Towneley Mysteries to be of the earlier half of the 15th century, and it can hardly be placed much later, we have in it a proof that such plays had already been commonly acted at Wakefield. The same Correspondent states:"Some months since I was in the Church of Tolleshunt Darcy, Essex, and observing a Brass Plate loosened from the slab to which it had been fixed, I took it up and read thereon, Here, under this stone, lyeth Antony Darcey, esquier, Justice of the Peace to our Sovraigne Lord King Henry VIII. which Antony deceased the xviii. of October, An° dni MVXL;' and then turning it over I found on the other side, in a more ancient character, this inscription: Orate specialiter pro a'i'abus [animabus] Roberti le Wale et Matildis consortis ejusdem, quorum corpora sub isto lapide sunt humata, qui obierunt, vicessimo uno die mensis maii anno domini milesimo trecentesimo LXII. animabus quorum propicietur altisimus, amen.' This struck me as extremely singular : There is, however, no end of the tricks of undertakers and those connected with funerals, such as leaden coffins without bottoms, and the mere painting of the letters, without any cutting or chiseling, upon marble tablets, which in a few years disappear and leave a blank; and the instance here mentioned was, suppose, a trick of the same sort, of an early date; for it seems pretty clear that the engraver of the inscription for Sir Antony Darcey (however he obtained it) made use of a plate which had near 200 years before answered the same purpose for Robert le Wale. As to the family of Wale or De Wale, I find they flourished in Northamptonshire in the reigns of Edward the Second and Edward the Third, and that Sir Thomas Wale, who signalized himself in King Edward the Third's wars, was one of the first knights of the Garter, and died in 1352." We have met with more than one instance of this same kind. About three years back, when visiting the church of Berkhampstead in Hertfordshire, we observed on a tomb the impression in the resinous matter with which the brass plates were fixed on the stone, of an inscription which, though reversed, we nearly decyphered. Presently after, however, we were told that the plate which had been removed, was remaining in the town, and accordingly on repairing to the National School we found it. Our copy of the inscription is at present mislaid, or we would add it. In 1804, Mr. Richardson published a Portrait of Margaret Duchess of Burgundy, sister of Edward IV. king of England, T. Kerrich del. from an ancient picture in the possession of Mr. Kerrich.Where is now the original of this curious Portrait, as it is not to be found among Mr. Kerrich's collection, bequeathed by him to the Society of Antiquaries? A Subscriber will feel obliged to any Gentleman who will inform him in whose possession Hopkinson's MSS. are to be found. They are mentioned by Whitaker in his edition of Thoresby's Leeds; and it is believed they were some time ago in the hands of a Lady in Yorkshire. GENTLEMAN'S MAGAZINE. THE LIFE OF OLIVER GOLDSMITH. BY JAMES PRIOR, ESQ. 2 vols. 8vo. Murray, 1837. LORD JOHN RUSSELL tells us," what most contributes to render biography amusing, is a certain singularity, and some degree of forwardness and presumption in the hero." Should the History of the Author of the Deserted Village not prove so interesting as might be expected, the Biographer may justly urge that he had but one of the three qualifications necessary to his success; unless by a greater proportion of one quality he could compensate for a deficiency in the remainder. Much of the obscurity which has rested on the early history of Goldsmith and his family, has been owing to the materials for his life not having been collected, or at least made use of, while they were yet fresh in the recollection of his friends. Dr. Johnson was probably prevented from being the biographer of his friend, by the copyright of a bookseller standing in the way. He would doubtless have approached his work with all the warm remembrances of a long and affectionate friendship, and with a familiar acquaintance with the rich and various resources of Goldsmith's mind. This feeling and knowledge, guarded as they would have been by Johnson's stern regard for truth, would have afforded us a biographical portrait, not less interesting than that of Savage, from the brightness of its colours and the elegance and force of the narrative; but also far excelling it in the character of the person described, and the variety of anecdotes which would have illustrated his portraiture of a much superior mind. The stamina of such a work may be seen in his epitaph, which would have been expanded into a full and comprehensive history of his friend. He would have done by Goldsmith as he was said to have done by Warburton-as he defended him whilst living, amidst the clamour of his enemies,' so he would have praised him when dead,' amidst the silence of his friends.' The task which Johnson left undone, appeared as it were naturally to fall into Dr. Percy's hands; whose learning, taste, and knowledge of Goldsmith would no doubt have combined to form a very agreeable and instructive history of the poet. With this purpose in view he had collected considerable materials; but his translation to a bishoprick, his residence in a remote part of Ireland, and his distance from books and personal sources of information, with some reasons of a conscientious nature as regarded the duties of his situation, prevented his design being carried into effect. The History of Goldsmith was therefore, for some period of time, little known to the public, or beyond the circle of his friends, till Boswell's Life of Johnson appeared, when he came forward amidst the principal characters in the great Portrait-gallery of that singularly attractive work. For some years after, several books of anecdotes and autobiography were published, by persons more or less intimate with him; till by the recollections of various friends the features of the picture were completed; and the pencils of Reynolds and Bunbury were more than rivalled in fulness of detail, if not in fidelity of touch, by the pens of Hawkins and Northcote, of Colman and Cumberland. The volumes of these writers, with a few others, are the great storehouses of information, which in all probability * See Life of Lord Russell, Pref. ix. will now receive little or no addition; as we presume, that in the death of Cradock and of Colman, the grave has closed on all those who were personally acquainted with the Poet; and all that subsequent labour has found left for it to do, is to glean a few anecdotes that have straggled away from the main body; to make public some letters which had been reposing among the dust of neglected papers; and correct some erroneous dates It is true that in these various mirrors in which and statements. the mental form of the poet was reflected, the likeness was not always favourable, nor always consistent. The temper of Sir John Hawkins threw a dark and unpleasing hue over his sketch; which was too faithfully followed by his daughter. Mr. Cradock wrote, we think, from loose and distant recollections; and Cumberland drew upon his imagination, when facts were too troublesome to collect, or not brilliant enough to glitter in his history. Yet, after all, there was a great mass of anecdote collected, among which that which was true must have predominated. The features were caricatured; but the intelligent reader would not be at a loss where to reduce the exaggeration, and by a comparison of one with another, to There were, however, circumstances in approach nearly to the truth. which the account of Goldsmith, as given us in occasional memoirs, would probably differ from that delivered in a regular and authentic biography. In the first place, a great deal has been told, which the friendly biographer would have concealed, or at least silently passed over; he would have felt bound in duty to respect the character that he took upon himself to delineate; and while he withheld nothing which could have enabled the public to form a right estimate of the subject, he would not have drawn aside the curtain that concealed the privacy of domestic intercourse, and exposed to view the weakness and inconsistency of the thoughtless and confidential hours of a chequered and too fortuitous life. The skilful painter can preserve the fidelity of the resemblance, while he knows how to add all becoming embellishments. In heightening what is naturally beautiful, in throwing a shade over the less attractive parts, he presents us with a work that is at once pleasing and instructive. The biographer, like the former, must form his narrative on selection; all things belonging to a subject are not worth the telling; when the circle of information is once completed, it is most often the wisest part to rest satisfied with the effect produced. Such evidently was the rule which guided Mason in that very elegant and judicious account which he gave of his illustrious friend, the author of the Bard: and though later inquirers have explored and unlocked some channels which he did not wish to open, they have left the original sketch very little altered, and hardly at all improved. In this he followed, though with a more liberal allowance to rational curiosity than had before been granted, the general practice of all biographers; but Boswell's Life of Johnson opened at once the floodgates of public desire on this subject, and set up an example too faithfully imitated, of an indiscriminate development of facts, gratifying a not very honourable or healthy curiosity, with the minutest details of personal history, the eccentricities of social intercourse, and all the singularities of private life. The original work, however defective we may think it in its plan, derived a lustre from the greatness of its subject; but it has been the cause of overwhelming literature with a mass of the most heavy and tiresome biographies of very moderate and obscure men; with cumbersome details of a life and a correspondence without interest, and character without talent; neither illuminated with spirit, nor enriched with fact. Vous me parlez, says D'Olivet, 'd'un homme de lettres; parlez-moi donc de ses talens, parlez 6 |